Sunday, September 24, 2006

Literary Totalitarians

A Friend of Eggers calling himself Quilty went on one of those encyclopedia sites last week to mutilate my profile with a personal attack.

I'm used to it. What the person said gave a glimpse into that crowd's mindset.

They feel they were tricked by me. Our legitimate DIY literary movement, which existed before the ULA was founded, was given a smidgen of attention. A few stray words of independence broke through their totalitarian wall. Writers who would not in 10,000 years be covered by the literary totalitarians were written about. An author like Jack Saunders who's been ignored for decades was written about. Non-conformist writers representing 90% of American society were written about.

Panic quickly set in. "Ohmygod! We no longer have 100% of the literary pie, are down to 99% of it. How did this happen?"

Orders were quickly sent out to robotic demi-puppet lit-bloggers: "Re-institute blackballing."

Then: silence. No one making waves. No criticism of today's corrupt literary system. The totalitarian sea is once again placid. One can look across its vast expanse and see not a ripple. Anyplace. Peace. Harmony. Lobotomy.

13 comments:

When King Wenclas engages in personal attacks, it's revolution.When other people attack King Wenclas, they're evil corporate blackballers.

And yeah, yeah - this is because King Wenclas doesn't have any power or influence. Until he achieves power and influence then anyone calling him on his bullshit is a sellout friend of Eggers.

Of course, he will never achieve any power or influence because he calls anyone who disagrees with him a corporate sellout. And, of course, he doesn't want any power or influence anyway, because then he'd be a corporate sellout himself. Which he isn't. He's a revolutionary! You can tell because he's calling bigwigs on their bullshit but doesn't allow the calling of his own bullshit!

What a confused post from a confused person.I hope the ULA achieves influence WITHOUT becoming part of the monopolies. That's the entire idea of our campaign.Of course we want influence! We want to influence literature. We want to open the doors of literature to allow in new voices.I don't call everyone who disagrees with me a corporate sellout. But if someone IS a corporate sellout-- Lependorf for instance-- then I'll call it as it is, using evidence and examples to bolster my case.Have my attacks on Moody been personal attacks?Are they not bolstered by evidence and facts?Why not address the circumstances of the case, "Jimmy"? Discuss the evidence.(One thing you need to do-- are you really a writer?-- is distinguish the meaning of words. Attacking me isn't blackballing. It's not what I was referring to. Blackballing is squelching any mention of an organization, through peer pressure, threats, and intimidation.)Obviously, a variety of tactics have been tried against the ULA. Who can deny it?Yes, we are in a battle with the monopolistic viewpoint of literature.Can you distinguish between the different positons in this society between an aristocrat like Rick Moody, and those writers in the ULA?WHO has access to power and publicity?Who doesn't?(ULA writers aren't necessarily shut out because we're in the ULA, incidentally. We've always been shut out; never allowed access.Watch for my upcoming new "ULA Monday Report," which will address this question further.)p.s. When I re-opened this blog for comments, I stated that I wanted no spam and no fake identities.I suspect you already have a lot of access to get your words and ideas out there, and don't need more provided by me-- unless you care to post under your real identity.

2. Someone "mutilating your profile" on a public-edited encyclopedia isn't blackballing. How can it be? What are you being denied? It's just rude.

3. Insulting writers on a blog, for whatever reason and even if they deserve it, is also rude.

I'm in favor of rudeness. That's why I slap posters up wherever the fuck I want. I thought the ULA was in favor of rudeness, too. Your actions certainly show it. But suddenly when someone's rude to you, that's blackballing? Whatever. Go fuck up Rick Moody's entry if you're feeling cranky.

Again, in my post I was referring to two different actions; the mutilation of my profile one of them.With that, I raised the question of blackballing-- which seems to be a mode of operating.p.s. Your fake identity isn't remotely believable.Can you substantiate it more?Where else have you been posting?How come you're not advertising your achievements?Have a web site?Any history at all?Maintain your game-playing, and I certainly will delete you. I long ago ran out of patience with such people.

Who's blackballed you, then? The establishment? Well, you insult them all the time. Comes with the territory. And I assume you don't want to be with them anyway, so you've been blackballed by a system you despise. Why does that matter in the slightest?

I, on the other hand, am being threatened with blackballing from you if I don't prove my cred. Well, I live in Oakland. I'm part of the Arms Akimbo collective which started as a queer action group in the 80s, although I'm just a kid so I wasn't with them then. I'm broke and I'm stupid about computers. I don't have a website. If that makes me worthy of being blackballed from your precious blog, whatever. Though I don't understand what you're afraid of in opening up debate. If I were Dick Cheney in disguise it wouldn't change the argument we're having. That's part of the point of the art I do: when I put up posters, I don't care if people know who I am. I want them to look at the work and respond to it without caring if I'm cool enough, practiced enough, techniqued enough, street enough, whatever. You, on the other hand, seem to care about the machine first and the work second. It's more important to you if a writer is an outsider - look at your first reaction to Tao Lin, "is he a phony?" - rather than if she's producing good work. Bully for you. But that's not my philosophy. And so now I guess I get kicked off your blog.

Please, stow the martyrdom act. You're about to be blackballed by-- what? An obscure member of a very obscure lit group? A representative of the most powerless writers group in North America?You seem to have no understanding of context.No understanding of who has access in this civilization and who doesn't.Why are you taking the side of the conglomerates? Do they really need your help?I still think you're a bullshit artist. You're from Oakland? What poets there could you possibly have been talking about, who criticized us as "schoolboys"? Care to name one?How would they possibly know about us? Has the ULA ever done a reading there? (No.)How did you find out about us? Why the big concern? What makes us so dangerous? The people we're criticizing have, oh, 10,000 times the resources we have. Many times the access to ways to make noise about their products.The writers in the ULA have been shut out ALL their lives. Do you understand the concept?Blackballing? I gave examples on Tao's blog.What do you call it when a lit-blogger calls our "Howl" counter-reading the most exciting event she ever witnessed-- yet never once mentions us?Do you see anyone in the lit-world rushing to cover our expose of conglomerate takeover of CLMP-- a recent "ULA Monday Report"?Did you read this blog post? Friend of Eggers Quilty (who I've heard from before over the fake letter to the Ruminator-- he posts from the west coast, incidentally) specifically made the point that it was a mistake to give the ULA any kind of attention. I guess we didn't deserve it. Gee, does the mainstream cover only those people who agree with them?That's democracy alright!("Well, those writers are criticizing us. Ergo, they don't exist.")Frankly, your head is screwed on so ass-backwards that your ridiculous notions could be coming only FROM someone like a Rick Moody.You're a graphic artist of some sort? Then why is your blog concerned with "bad books"?Isn't that in fact what Moody himself has ostensibly been against-- his justification for his choices during the National Book Awards fiasco?Come on, you'll have to do better!(I mailed out excerpts from the CLMP Report to almost 100 literary and publishing people-- many with new ties to CLMP. See any of these believers in free speech checking in? Defending here their actions?)It's a lot like our original Protest against Moody receiving a Guggenheim he clearly didn't need. We mailed the Protest out to 300 important establishment literary people-- it'd been signed already by 40 zeensters-- and can you guess how many Icons of Integrity signed the Protest? (Many later admitted to Page Six they agreed with it privately. PRIVATELY!)None signed it. Zero. Nada. Zilch.Where else can you find such absolute-- ABSOLUTE-- conformity but in the literary arena?Blackballing? ALL strong or upsetting contrary ideas are blackballed by the established lit scene-- anything which rocks the boat of their own privilege and unchallenged standing.Yep, a stray artist in Oakland is upset over my challenges to the literary conglomerates. He has no stake in the debate whatsoever, but is still irritated.Those poor monopolies! My remarks threaten to knock them down to 99.999% of the pie. Unbelievable.

I've never defended any corporate interests from your attacks or anyone else's.

I find your methods suspect and your constant search for "cred" to be irritating and pretentious. Not because I stand to lose millions of corporate bucks because of it - just because I do.

You remove my comments from your blog in the name of opening up debate, and you think I'm part of an intricate conspiracy because you've never heard of me.

I can only hope that you are, as some poets told me - and I won't name them, as they're either part of Your Big Conspiracy or shams because you've never heard of them, the only two options in your skull - drunk when you rant like this, because it's the only good excuse for it.

Wow! I put some passion behind my writing. Not done! Sorry if I'm not a lobotomized robot.(FYI: I deleted ONE post of yours, which was a gratuitous phrase of about five words. Do you ever stop being a con artist?Have a nice day.)